The Truth About Facebook Revenues, User Numbers, And Its IPO

Enough! Here's the truth about Facebook revenues, user numbers,
and its IPO plans.

We've heard from a source who would know that 2010
revenues will come in between $1.5 billion and $2
billion. People say Facebook's 2010 revenues will be $1
billion to $1.1 billion because an interviewer recently put those
numbers to CEO Mark
Zuckerberg,
and he said "estimates are not so far off in either direction
that it’s causing us any pain, so we feel no need to correct
it." The truth is Facebook wants to keep this bar low and
easy to clear.

Facebook
could very well have far more than 500 million users.
For one, 500 million is how many "monthly active" users they say
they have. For another,
Facebook freely admits it sandbags user-number announcements
to keep expectations low enough to exceed them.

Facebook will not go public for a very long time – and it
might not ever. A source
told us in March that an IPO could be 36 months away. Even
when Facebook does IPO, it will be less like most public
companies and more like a private company with some non-voting
shares available to the public.